The Lady and the Lord | Page 3

stood, so it seemed best to me to run up a real, fat bill with a big man, who might possibly wait for his money and give me a chance to turn round.
"Then I asked to see the proprietor of the hotel. When he'd finished bowing--they're not in the least like American hotel proprietors, they're really polite--I asked him if he knew Mr. Lewisohn; and he told me that Mr. Lewisohn was his lawyer and conducted all his legal business."
"He was probably the gentleman who sued the guests who neglected to pay their bills," I suggested.
"Probably. But he said that Mr. Lewisohn was a most influential and respected gentleman. I suppose he meant by that that he had a big political pull; but they have such a funny way of expressing things in England, and you can never be quite sure what they do mean."
"I know it," I said. "They call a 'four-flusher' a 'chancer,' even when she's a woman and pretty."
She actually blushed.
"I wasn't a four-flusher. And if you're going to be rude, I won't tell you the story. I knew that I was after a certainty; the only difficulty was in getting somebody with money to believe it."
"I was only citing an instance," I said guiltily. "Go on with the story."
"Well, I told Mr. Bertram--that was the proprietor's name--that mine was most important business, and that I wouldn't have an inkling of it get in the papers for anything; and I asked him to be sure not to answer any questions about me to anybody. He said he would be most discreet--just like that--'most discreet.'
"Then I asked him whether I could count on Mr. Lewisohn to be most discreet, and he assured me that I could; so I asked him to telephone for an appointment for me, and he did it at once. Later on I ordered a carriage to drive round to the lawyer's office.
"They tried to palm off a one-horse thing on me at first; but I sent it back and ordered a landau with two horses, and the proprietor of the hotel came out himself and helped me into the carriage.
"In Southampton people don't usually drive when they're going to see their lawyers; they walk. I know that, because when I got there I wasn't kept waiting a minute. The clerk showed me right in.
"Mr. Lewisohn proved to be a little man, with a shiny bald head and a ring of coal-black curly hair all round it, just like a monk's. He was sitting in a dark corner at a large roll-top desk, with rows and rows of black steel boxes on shelves behind him.
"Until your eyes got used to the light you could scarcely make out his features at all, and he made me sit on a chair where the light fell right on me. But I'd taken a lot of trouble with my toilet that morning, and I didn't feel nervous in the least.
"He didn't put his feet on the desk, or smoke, as Broadway lawyers do; but he sat back and listened to what I had to say with his hands folded in front of him, and his thumbs twisting round and round each other slowly. And every time I stopped talking he nodded.
"I told him that I had had a letter of introduction to another lawyer, whose name I wouldn't mention; but that Mr. Bertram, the proprietor of the hotel, had told me that Mr. Lewisohn was much the best lawyer in the place, and I had decided to place my business in his hands.
"I'm not sure even now whether he was so used to hearing himself described as the best lawyer in the place that it had ceased to interest him, or whether he was suspicious of any attempt at flattery. I'm inclined to think he was suspicious--the least attempt at civility makes the English suspicious--I've found that out. At all events, he didn't seem to appreciate it very much.
"But he kept on nodding and nodding while I talked, and when I mentioned the Carruthers estates he woke up at once and began making notes. At last he made another appointment for the following day; and I had evidently succeeded in impressing him favorably, because he showed me to the door of the office himself, instead of letting the clerk do it.
"And, of course, then he couldn't help seeing the carriage and pair; I was glad of that.
"Of course, I knew he'd telephone to Bertram before I had time to get back to the hotel, but that didn't worry me; all Bertram could say was that I had first-cabin labels on my trunks, and that I had engaged an expensive room. Besides, he knew nothing against me, anyhow.
"I wasn't afraid of Bertram; and, as it turned out, I must have